Destination Choice of the Newly Arrived Immigrants to the U.S. from 2000 to 2005–2007: A Multivariate Explanation for Immigrants from Top Source Countries

Using the PUMS files of the 2000 U.S. Census and 2005–2007 merged ACS data, we study the metropolitan destination choices made by newly arrived immigrants from seven top source countries between 2000 and 2007. Using a multinomial logit model, we find that the dispersion of new immigrant groups varies by origin, although all groups were subject to 1) the attraction of co‐ethnic communities, and 2) the positive effects of labor market conditions in the destination (especially the employment growth rate). However, co‐ethnic concentration is much more important than labor market conditions in the destination choice decision, particularly for the poorly educated. Conversely, there is a strong negative effect of co‐ethnic concentration on highly educated new immigrants, revealing a dispersed geographical pattern of these highly educated immigrants. We also find the importance of employment share growth rate for highly educated immigrants which suggests that they are more sensitive to the upward employment structure at the destination than a specific job growth rate, and they may not be attracted by a metropolitan area with a low‐quality employment structure, despite whether there was an increase in high‐level jobs.     

Labor Market Segmentation in Urumqi,Xinjiang: Exposing Labor Market Segments and Testing the Relationship between Migration and Segmentation

Labor market segmentation and migration are two phenomena that are dramatically reshaping the spatial, economic, and social relationships of many urban cities in both developed and developing countries. To this point, the bulk of Chinese literature falls within the context of area studies, without much effort to link Chinese migration and emerging labor market outcomes to larger global trends and discourse. This research attempts to link the body of internal Chinese migration and emerging labor markets to labor market segmentation theory, primarily developed by urban economists and sociologists. My findings provide evidence that applying labor market segmentation theory to examine emerging markets in China offers fruitful results that help to identify the new urban stratification that exists in China. I employ a set of quantitative methods using employee‐level field data that I collected in Urumqi in 2008 to identify distinct segments within Urumqi's labor market and argue that migration is a major driver of labor market segmentation. Cluster analysis shows Uyghur minorities and women are found to be overwhelmingly concentrated in the lower sector, composed mostly of “bad” jobs. Discriminant analysis reveals that migrant status and ethnicity are the most important variables that deepen the gap among the labor market segments. The social inequality created as a result of market segmentation can partially explain Uyghur discontent in the region and the July 2009 riots, one of the worst riots in Xinjiang's modern history.     

Housing Demand,Coping Strategy,and Selection Bias

ABSTRACT In conventional modeling of housing demand, consumers choose living arrangement, tenure, and housing on the basis of price, income, wealth, and tastes. However, it is both costly and onerous to alter one's housing conditions. It is argued therefore that consumers employ housing strategies to cope with labor market risks and expectations about their future: strategies that may differ from one demographic group to the next. In conventional modeling of housing demand, it is also well‐known that selection bias can arise: that is, omitted variables that help account for one aspect of housing (say, tenure choice) also subsequently affect the nature of the demand function for other aspects of housing demand (say, the amount spent on housing by a renter household). One such variable is the consumer's wealth, a variable that is typically not available in household survey data. This paper argues that the most important variables that may give rise to selection bias are variables that also reflect the coping strategies employed by consumers. The paper estimates a model of housing choice using Canada‐wide pooled samples from the 1980s and 1990s. In this paper, the prices of housing services and income prospects vary region by region. The paper shows how individuals and families in different housing markets across Canada respond, and how this evidences the use of coping strategies (from doubling up to substandard housing). The paper presents evidence to support the argument that selection bias is important in understanding how consumers cope.     

Cities,Skills, and Inequality

ABSTRACT The surge in U.S. wage inequality over the past several decades is now commonly attributed to an increase in the returns paid to skill. Although theories differ with respect to why, specifically, this increase has come about, many agree that it is strongly tied to the increase in the relative supply of skilled (i.e., highly educated) workers in the U.S. labor market. A greater supply of skilled labor, for example, may have induced skill‐biased technological change or generated greater stratification of workers by skill across firms or jobs. Given that metropolitan areas in the U.S. have long possessed more educated populations than non‐metropolitan areas, these theories suggest that the rise in both the returns to skill and wage inequality should have been particularly pronounced in cities. Evidence from the U.S. Census over the period of 1950 to 1990 supports both implications.     

What drives the labor share of income in South Korea? A regional analysis

This study takes a regional approach to analyzing what drives labor's share of income for South Korea over 2000–2014. First, we document empirically that changes in the labor share within a region are the dominant component of the change in the aggregate labor share of national income. To study the dynamic determinants of the labor share of income at the regional level, a panel vector autoregression (PVAR) model is estimated to examine how the regional labor share responds to innovations in an array of variables suggested by theoretical models. Consistent with theory, we confirm that technology, capital intensity and market concentration are the key variables explaining the labor share dynamics. Furthermore, we analyze the effects of trade openness and R&D expenditures on the regional labor share. Interestingly, we find that the labor share shows a different pattern of responses to the identified shocks depending upon the type of regions, that is, whether it is in the metropolitan or provincial areas. We also discuss the implications of our results for both theory and policy.     

Understanding the Non‐Metropolitan—Metropolitan Digital Divide

Abstract A consistent gap exists between home Internet use in metropolitan areas and in non‐metropolitan areas in the U.S. This digital divide may stem from technology differences in home Internet connectivity. Alternatively, differences in education, income, and other household attributes may explain differences in metropolitan and non‐metropolitan area home Internet access. Effective programs to reduce the metropolitan–non‐metropolitan digital divide must be based on an understanding of the relative roles that technology and household characteristics play in determining differential Internet usage. The household Internet adoption decision is modeled using a logit estimation approach with data from the 2001 U.S. Current Population Survey Internet and Computer Use Supplement. A decomposition of separate metropolitan and non‐metropolitan area estimates shows that differences in household attributes, particularly education and income, account for 63 percent of the current metropolitan–non‐metropolitan digital divide. The result raises significant doubts that policies which focus solely on infrastructure and technology access will mitigate the current metropolitan–non‐metropolitan digital divide.     

Disparities and Divided Growth: Ethnic Entrepreneurship in the Greater Los Angeles Area, 1980–2015

This study employs a multilevel research design to examine business ownership across ethnic groups in the greater Los Angeles area. It finds significant divide between white and non‐white businesses along the labor market hierarchy. The entrepreneurial environment, ethnic residential communities, ethnic business spatial clustering, ethnic concentration in particular niche sectors, and ethnic diversity in local areas are all related to business ownership and disparities across ethnic groups. The results suggest that ethnically diverse neighborhoods and co‐ethnic business communities could provide a conducive institutional environment and resources for minority businesses to start. However, in contrast to white owned businesses, ethnic minority businesses' concentration in the low‐end and easy‐entry sectors may reinforce their disadvantages and hinder upward economic mobility. This study provides policy implications for community regional development through entrepreneurship especially when race and ethnicity are concerned.     

Income Divergence between Mexican States in the 1990s: The Role of Skill Premium

ABSTRACT During the period 1940–1985 the variance of average incomes across Mexican states fell by 60 percent. Beginning in 1985, however, and coinciding with the adoption of trade liberalization policies and other market‐oriented reforms, state incomes began to diverge. Using microdata from the 1990 and 2000 Mexican Population Censuses, this study decomposes the recent divergence into components due to economy‐wide changes in skill prices and components due to state‐specific changes in the composition of workers. The study finds that the rise in the education premium hindered the progress of poor states and raised the variance of average state wages and labor earnings. However, educational attainment mostly compensated for this income‐widening effect. State‐level regressions reveal that the initial level of education, size of the agricultural sector, and distance from the U.S. border were important factors, while public infrastructure was not. While the border states clearly benefited from increased trade and opening of the economy, I find no evidence that skill demand or the immigration of highly educated workers particularly favored these states.     

The Shifting Destinations of Metropolitan Migrants in the U.S., 2005–2011

Recent estimates that central cities are growing faster than their suburbs in the U.S. have captured the attention of both academics and the popular media. Many commentators have used these numbers to claim that internal migration trends in the U.S. have reached a turning point, in which migrants increasingly prefer urban residences to suburban locales. However, these assertions often rely on problematic definitions of city and suburb, and pay too little attention to demographic variations among migrants. This paper examines whether recent internal migrants in the U.S. are choosing closer‐in destinations, drawing from microdata samples from the American Community Survey since 2005. During this period, there is an overall trend of migrants to the largest metropolitan areas in the U.S. choosing to migrate closer to the metropolitan core. However, this trend varies significantly among major demographic groups; whereas younger, single, educated, and white‐collar migrants show evidence of a return to the core, migrants who are blue‐collar, less‐educated, older, and with families remain more suburban. In turn, this analysis suggests that overall trends of “back to the city” migration are producing considerable divergence in the metropolitan destinations of different demographic groups.     

Does Sprawl Induce Affordable Housing?

The costs of sprawl are well documented, but there are fewer studies of its potential benefits. One such benefit is argued to be the facilitation of the filtering process, resulting in a greater quantity of affordable and available housing for low‐income households. While metropolitan area data indicate a positive correlation between sprawl and the supply of affordable housing for very low‐income households, regression analysis does not provide evidence for this hypothesis, after controlling for other metropolitan characteristics. The results put into question the argument that sprawl expands housing opportunities for households of all incomes, specifically those who are the poorest.     

The Quality of Education,Educational Institutions,and Cross‐Country Differences in Human Capital Accumulation

ABSTRACT Cross‐country studies of education and economic prosperity often reach conflicting results when using growth rates as the measure of economic development. However, growth rates lack persistence over time and may not accurately measure long‐term economic success over relatively short economic horizons. To overcome this potential specification problem, we estimate the relationship between key education variables and the capital to physical labor ratio. Using both cross‐sectional and panel specifications, we find that both the primary‐pupil–teacher ratio and decentralized education finance are associated with a larger capital to physical labor ratio. The relationship between human capital and expenditures, private education, and test scores are less robust.     

Short‐Run Dynamics of Income Disparities and Regional Cycle Synchronization in the U.S.

Since the 1990s, the issue of regional income convergence and its long‐term tendencies has been thoroughly and heatedly discussed. Much less attention, however, has been devoted to the short‐run dynamics of regional convergence. In particular, three important aspects have not yet been adequately addressed. First, it is indeed essential to understand whether regional disparities manifest a tendency to move systematically along the national cycle. Then, if this happens to be the case, it becomes crucial to know whether 1) these movements are pro‐ or counter‐cyclical,2) the cyclical evolution of the disparities is a consequence of differences in the timing with which the business cycle is felt in regions or it is motivated by the amplitude differences across local cyclical swings. In this paper, we shed light on these issues using data on personal income for the 48 coterminous U.S. states between 1969 and 2008. Our results indicate that income disparities do not move randomly in the short run but follow a distinct cyclical pattern, moving either pro‐ or counter‐cyclically depending on the period of analysis. These patterns are probably explained by the changes in the direction of capital and labor flows that favor developed or poorer states in different periods. As for the underlying mechanism, it appears that the short‐run evolution of the disparities in recent years is largely a consequence of differences in the timing with which the business cycle is felt across states rather than the outcome of amplitude differences across local cyclical swings.     

New Firm Formation and Industry Clusters: A Case of the Drugs Industry in the U.S.

The importance of new firms in regional growth led many scholars to probe the determinants of new firm formation. A close examination of cluster theory predicts that industry clusters can enhance new firm births as well as the productivity of existing firms. Linkages among firms and related institutions, which are the key characteritics of the cluster phenomenon, can serve as an important determinant of new firm formation. The network aspect of clusters helps nascent entrepreneurs find resources and information easier and faster than in an isolated environment. In addition, nascent entrepreneurs in industry clusters often have rich experience in existing local firms, which becomes important prior knowledge to explore new market opportunities. This study examines the effects of clusters on new firm formation. We found that the cluster based on knowledge sharing (i.e., knowledge–labor cluster) significantly affects the new firm formation process, whereas the cluster based on market transactions (i.e., value‐chain cluster) does not seem to play a role in new firm formation.     

农村小康建设亟需农民知识化

农民是农村小康建设的主体,而农民知识化又是农村小康建设的重中之重。据此,从增加农民收入、缩小城乡差别、转移农村剩余劳动力等方面论述了农民知识化在农村小康建设中的作用,全面分析了农民知识化进程中存在的问题,从激发农民求知的内在动因、加大农村基础教育、加强各种形式的教育和技术培训等方面提出了实现农民知识化的具体措施。     

Development Zones,Foreign Investment,and Global City Formation in Shanghai*

ABSTRACT The rapid economic ascent of China and the increasing integration of the world economy in the past two decades have made metropolises in China such as Shanghai and Beijing emerging global cities. Foreign investment is a central force underlying the emergence and transformation of the Chinese metropolises into global cities. This is especially true in Shanghai, which has experienced massive infusion of foreign investment. Varied forms of foreign investment or development zones have been created to promote foreign investment inflows, yet remain under‐studied. This paper analyzes structure, performance, and underlying factors of development zones in Shanghai, and discusses the implications for global city‐formation; it unfolds the variations among development zones, and illustrates the significant role of the state and local conditions. As the literature on global cities dwells primarily on the experiences of advanced economies, this paper further contributes to a better understanding of the dynamics of emerging global cities in the developing world.     

The Role of Education in Self–Employment Success in Finland

This paper analyzes the effect of self–employed persons’ education on the success of their firms during the economic downturn and upturn of the 1990's. It is found that the business cycle affects the relative closure rates of firms run by self–employed with any level of education. Exit probability is lower for the highly educated during bust, but higher in boom. This is accounted for by two facts. First, running a small firm is argued to be a less attractive choice to wage work, particularly for the highly educated, due to lower earning prospects, less stable stream of earnings, and the cultural tradition of working in large corporations. Second, the highly educated faced a higher outside demand for their labor than did the less educated during economic upturn. Finally, it was found that regardless of the state of aggregate economy, firms run by the highly educated have higher growth probabilities than those run by less educated persons.     

Exploring the recent upsurge in productivity disparities among European regions

This paper analyses thse evolution of productivity disparities across 156 European regions in the period 2000–2015. Using regional data, a battery of inequality indexes enables us to assess the extent of regional disparities. After confirming that labour productivity is the main component of income disparities, a dynamic shift-share analysis is carried out at a 10-industry level of disaggregation. The study evaluates the relative role of the three components underlying the disparities in regional productivity: changes in the industry mix, and within- and between-industry productivity gaps. The main results can be summarised as follows. First, regional disparities are on the rise again in the EU. Second, most regions are now closer to the average, while a small group of the richest regions are moving further away. Third, the main drivers of productivity disparities are within-industry differences in labour productivity with regard to the richest regions and, less importantly, the specialisation of the richest regions in more progressive industries. Finally, the net effect of structural change is still making a positive contribution to convergence with the leading regions.     

QTL analysis for soil‐surface roots originating from a New Plant Type rice (Oryza sativa L.)

The introgression line YTH16 harbouring chromosome segments from the New Plant Type cultivar IR65600–87–2‐2–3 with genetic background of an Indica Group rice IR 64 forms soil‐surface roots. To clarify the genetic mechanism, QTL analysis was performed using hybrid populations derived from a cross between IR 64 and YTH16. A total of eight QTLs were detected in the three introgressed segments on chromosomes 2, 5 and 7. Seven chromosome segment lines (CSLs) combining these three QTL regions were selected from the progenies. The two CSLs harbouring a single region (excluding the CSL with a region on chromosome 5) showed high scores and low means of root angle distribution in comparison with IR 64. Four CSLs harbouring two or three regions showed high scores and low means of root angle distribution in comparison with YTH16 and the CSLs harbouring a single QTL region. These results indicated that the soil‐surface rooting of YTH16 was controlled by the three QTLs’ regions and that chr. 5 particularly played a role in supporting the effect with others.     

Partial least squares regression and importance–satisfaction analyses of the strategic drivers of happiness: A quality of life survey in Seoul,Korea

Using survey data by the Seoul Metropolitan Government for 5 years (n = 228,103 individuals), this study analyzes the magnitudes of the impacts of major grouping variables on variations in the overall happiness through partial least squares regression analysis. This study then uses the importance–satisfaction analysis to explore how the between‐group variations can be reduced according to the current satisfaction as well as the ultimate importance of the five happiness components (health, finance, relationships with close relatives/friends, home life, and social life). The regression finds that self‐respect‐as‐a‐Seoul‐citizen, social class recognition, years (other than 2014), household income, and not being elderly have a positive difference in happiness. The importance of the social class recognition over the objective income suggests the validity of soft policies for increasing happiness as a subjective concept. The low happiness level in 2014 may reflect history effects or events that occurred in that year. The importance–satisfaction analysis presents customized strategies by group. Specifically, policies oriented to financial happiness are prioritized for groups with low values on self‐respect, class recognition, household income, and age while health‐ and home life‐related policies should be additionally arranged for the older population.     

Living in Two Worlds: A Review of Home‐to‐Work Decisions

ABSTRACT This paper discusses various aspects of the economic analysis of commuting behavior. It starts with a review of two difficulties associated with urban economics models: the empirically falsified prediction of the relation between commuting time and income, and the presence of substantial excess commuting. Notwithstanding these anomalies, research that focuses directly on the value of travel time provides evidence that there is substantial resistance against commuting among large groups of workers. However, commuting costs are just one among many other explanatory variables for actual commuting behavior, and commuting itself has become much less onerous over time. This suggests that commuting costs play a much more limited role than has been assumed in the past. On the other hand, empirical evidence suggests that space is more important than one would be inclined to think on the basis of the considerations just given. These empirical regularities suggest that other space‐related aspects of the functioning of urban labor and housing markets are more important than was previously thought.